Chicago Moves to Ban Officers With Extremist Group Ties

Chicago aldermen want cops with ties to hate groups off the force. A City Council committee takes up the measure Monday, and a full vote could come as soon as April 15, 2026.

The ordinance was written by Ald. Matt Martin of the 47th Ward. It would hand the Civilian Office of Police Accountability authority to investigate officers who actively participate in organizations like the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. The City Council’s Workforce Development Committee is scheduled to meet at 10:30 a.m. Monday to consider the proposal.

“If you’re part of a violent hate group, you shouldn’t be empowered to enforce Chicago’s laws,” Martin said.

That quote doesn’t leave much room for interpretation. Martin’s been working on this for a while, too. He said the ordinance went through 17 drafts over more than a year, developed alongside multiple city agencies. That’s not a rushed job. It’s the product of a drawn-out, deliberate process that touched a lot of corners of city government before it landed in front of a committee.

What counts as “active participation” under the measure? It’s broader than you might expect. Paying dues to a banned group qualifies. So does showing up to meetings, recruiting new members, or posting content online that promotes extremist activity. Officers would also be prohibited from planning hate crimes, carrying them out, or providing any material support for them. The language is specific by design.

The Proud Boys and Oath Keepers are called out by name in the ordinance’s framing. Before the Trump administration took office in January 2025, the FBI had designated the Proud Boys as an antisemitic white supremacist organization. The bureau categorized the Oath Keepers as a large, loosely organized network of individuals, some with militia ties, who’ve vowed to defy what they consider unconstitutional government orders.

Both groups sent members to the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Leaders from each organization were later convicted of seditious conspiracy. Trump pardoned them before Martin’s ordinance ever reached a committee room.

That context matters. The political ground has shifted. With federal designations reversed and convictions wiped out by presidential pardons, some aldermen may not want to put their names on anything that looks like a rebuke of groups the current administration has rehabilitated. Others may have questions about whether the Civilian Office of Police Accountability can actually handle a new investigative mandate without more resources.

What the ordinance targets, at its core, are organizations that advocate the violent overthrow of any level of U.S. government. Not just the federal government. Any level. City, state, county. That’s a deliberate expansion of scope, and it’s a direct response to the kind of anti-government ideology that defined both the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers before their federal designations were walked back.

Chicago’s been wrestling with this kind of question for years. The Chicago Police Department has faced documented scrutiny over officers with connections to extremist networks, and COPA’s investigative reach has been a persistent subject of debate since the office was created. Martin’s ordinance tries to settle at least one piece of that argument by drawing a clear line: officers who affiliate with groups rooted in racial hatred or anti-government violence don’t belong on the force, period.

The WTTW News reported the committee vote was set for this week. If the Workforce Development Committee clears the measure Monday, the full City Council could vote by April 15, 2026, making it one of the more significant police accountability actions the council has taken up this year.

Martin’s put 17 versions and 26 months of work into this. The committee room Monday is where it either moves or stalls.